Chapter 63: Emptiness

They were two people in the car, but for now, Julian was on his own. He kept his eyes moving between the road and the mirrors, checking corners and side streets, even with no one beside him doing the other half of the job. The street ahead was empty, quiet in that wrong way everything had been quiet since the portals opened — no traffic, no pedestrians, just the hum of the engine and the wind through the cracked window. Every intersection got a glance, every parked car a second look before he let it pass out of view. He wasn’t completely alone, though — his monster ran alongside the car, keeping pace effortlessly, claws striking the asphalt in a steady rhythm just outside his window, ready to move the second something came at them.

„Michael, I don’t know who you’re texting, but hurry up!“ Julian’s eyes flicked to the mirror and back to the road, checking on him without taking his attention off driving. He didn’t get an answer, and after a second he glanced over properly, just for a moment, frowning at the way Michael hadn’t so much as looked up.

Michael wasn’t listening. He hadn’t heard a word of it. His eyes were locked on the screen in his hand, thumb frozen mid-scroll, reading the messages he’d gotten.

The sender was Johannes, his younger brother.

*Gabriel, Michael, you’re probably in a fight right now, or some other situation that isn’t exactly safe. That’s why I’m not calling. I’m with Andrea. We’re safe. But our parents…*

The blood froze in Michael’s veins. His breathing stopped. His hand, still holding the phone, went rigid. The world outside the window kept moving, but something inside him had gone completely still, like time itself had skipped a beat and forgotten to come back. He didn’t know what he was feeling. Were these even feelings? Or was it just emptiness? A vast, enormous emptiness?

*…didn’t make it.*

The emptiness filled instantly with a thousand questions, all of them crashing in at once, none of them answerable anymore.

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*When did I last see them?

What did we last talk about?

Did we fight?

How were they feeling?

Were they mad at me?

When will I see them again?

What will we do together?

None of that matters, though — they’re always there. I can make all of it up later. They’re there. They’re always there.

There’s still time for all of that.*

Then it hit him. A pain he couldn’t understand or describe. Was that what this was? Pain? It didn’t hurt, not exactly. It was something else. Emptiness. An emptiness that hurt. It sat somewhere behind his ribs, spreading outward, cold and hollow at once, filling every part of him that used to hold something else.

It was such an unbearable feeling. *Go away. Go away! GO AWAY!* he thought. It wouldn’t stop. His throat tightened around nothing. The road outside the window blurred at the edges into smears of gray. *STOP IT. DISAPPEAR!* It didn’t disappear. It felt like he was trapped inside the endlessness of this brutal, hollow feeling. *No. No. I refuse. No. NO!*

The feeling sat in his chest, heavy. He felt so much heavier now, pressed down under the weight of it, broken. Weak. His shoulders sagged against the seat like something inside him had simply given out.

*They’re gone. Gone. Forever. FOREVER.*

They had always been there, in his life. From the first second. From his first heartbeat. People had come and gone around him, but they had always stayed. At some point he’d stopped appreciating that. They’d become something he took for granted, something that would just always be there without him having to think about it, without him having to work for it or hold onto it.

A tear slipped down his face, then another, tracking down to his jaw before he even registered they were there. *What is that? Why are my eyes watering? What is THIS supposed to be?*

At extreme temperatures — very hot, or very cold — the body stops telling the difference. Hot and cold blur into one another, until you’re neither burning nor freezing. Was it the same with feelings? *What am I feeling right now? Is it grief? Anger? Hatred? Sorrow? Emptiness? No. It’s nothing. And everything, all at once.*

He kept reading.

*Before you lose your nerve, or lose control — listen to me.*

A completely different feeling rose up in him, suddenly. Hope, sharp and immediate, cutting straight through everything else. *What? Are they alive after all? Could it be? Why is he being so vague about it? This idiot.*

*We only have each other now.*

…

The hope vanished as fast as it had come. The emptiness returned, that same indescribable feeling — and this time it swallowed him whole. He couldn’t breathe. His body felt so heavy. Unbearably heavy.

*No one else. So think twice before you do anything that could hurt this family even more, or destroy it completely. I know it’s hard. But we have to get through this. We’re not the only ones dealing with this. No family gets through this without losing someone.*

Michael continued on reading the messages.

*If you want to help us — survive. Get stronger.*

*He’s right. Everything he’s saying makes sense… so why does it make me even angrier? Even more furious? Even emptier?!? I’m supposed to be the one who doesn’t feel things. So why is everything hitting me this hard… why is he the reasonable one all of a sudden?!*

He stared at the last line of the message without seeing it anymore, the letters blurring into nothing while that same cold, heavy weight sat in his chest, pressing down harder with every second, like it was looking for a way out and finding none.

CRAAASH.

Something slammed into the car, hard enough to jolt the whole frame sideways and tear Michael violently out of his thoughts.